I think in this case international law stood in the way of doing the right thing.
The CIA is blinded, too, by the squeamishness that many liberal-minded people feel about noticing the dark side of third world cultures.
Right now, American law bars the admission of aliens suspected of terrorist activity - but not of terrorist sympathies.
We can train Iraqi soldiers to combat insurgencies while respecting human rights, as we have trained armies in the Philippines and Latin America.
We must do our utmost to preserve our British ally's strategic independence from Europe.
No operational commander should have to assign a soldier a task that could be done as well by a computer, a remote sensor, or an unmanned airplane.
Law-abiding citizens value privacy. Terrorists require invisibility. The two are not the same, and they should not be confused.
But if the UN cannot or will not revise its rules in ways that establish beyond question the legality of the measures the United States must take to protect the American people, then we should unashamedly and explicitly reject the jurisdiction of these rules.
National sovereignty is an obligation as well as an entitlement. A government that will not perform the role of a government forfeits the rights of a government.
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